And I Survived
by lrigD
Summary: SPOILERS for next week! If you've seen the promo, I'm sure you already know what this little story is about. The scene at the end... I just couldn't leave it alone.


**_Meh, episode was OK, promo was AMAZING. So here it is: my version (one of many, undoubtedly) of some wishful thinking on my part on how next episode will pan out. Enjoy!_**

**_Characters don't belong to me!_**

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Booth blinked.

This was big.

He had a feeling something monumental would happen soon.

She was talking and he knew he should listen to her, that this was important, _really_ important, but for a moment he could not focus.

As always, she had impeccable timing.

"I missed my chance."

She sounded so small, so sad. He'd never heard her like this: even during that fateful conversation after revisiting the first case, she had been relatively calm.

Then again, she had been on the receiving end. And she hadn't been involved in a case where nobody could ignore the parallels between herself and the deceased.

Now…

He risked a look at her, his face creasing with worry as he saw the tears on her cheeks. His first instinct was to touch her cheeks, remove the wetness, but he stopped his movements. It felt entirely natural, but it shouldn't be.

When he looked back at the road, he saw a traffic light just flashing to orange. He accelerated and, once passed the junction, looked at Bones again.

Oh God.

She was crying.

Not just tears, not her usual quiet tears and subtle sobs.

Her entire body had deflated and she sagged against the seat, hiding her face in her hands, her shoulders shaking and her sobs resounded in the car.

In that moment, Booth made a decision. It would have impact, he was sure of that, but he did it anyway. Had to do it.

Looking around, he parked his car in the first empty spot – hardly noticing it was a spot for disabled.

"Bones…"

He moved towards her, hesitant. His emotions were so mixed he couldn't figure out what to do.

"No, Booth, it's…" she moved one hand from her face and feebly waved it. "It's …"

She couldn't even talk.

The seriousness of the situation hit Booth like a brick.

"Bones, come here." A hug wouldn't solve anything, he was only too aware of that, but he'd never been more determined.

She didn't meet him, and when he leaned forward she pressed against the door, looking for an escape.

"Bones, no." He stopped her hands as she tried to open the door.

"We can't continue like this. We've got to talk."

For once, he was thankful she didn't recognize the clichéd "We've got to talk" line, that she didn't know it was almost always negative. Although he had no idea what the result of this particular talk would be.

"I can't…" she flailed around with her arms. "You… and – you're…"

Seeing as he already held her hands, he pulled her towards him and crushed her against his chest. There was not a single sign of protest from her, which told him how devastated she really was.

"Bones…" He didn't seem to be able to say anything but her name, over and over again, rocking her back and forth like she was Parker when he was sick and the only thing calming him would be the gentle rocking motion.

"Bones…"

She didn't acknowledge him. She only gripped his shirt and twisted it in her hands, and he knew it would ruin the shirt but he was strangely okay with it.

"Bones…"

He wondered how he could have missed this. It was obviously something that had been building up for a while now, because that was the way Brennan worked, and he hadn't seen a thing.

Had Hannah blinded him so much? Or had she become a blind spot for him?

He felt guilty as he recalled the changed relationship with her. He had tried to balance Hannah and Bones, spending time with both of them, but maybe, with the way Hannah had been so nervous about meeting Parker, he had left Brennan a little alone.

And then this case…

His eyes widened as he realized, for the first time, how truly terrifying the case must have been for her. To what extent she recognized herself in Lauren. And he cursed himself for not noticing it earlier.

He could feel the exact moment she started to compose herself. She stiffened in his arms and his left hand, which he had been rubbing up and down her back gently, abruptly fell away as she moved away from him.

"I apologize, Booth," she said, and although her words were stiff and impersonal, her voice was scratchy and sad and it told him much more than her words did.

"Bones, hey…" He tilted her chin and she looked up at him, and for a moment he was amazed her beauty, even now, before he could stop it.

"It's gonna be okay," he said in a voice he usually stored for post-nightmare meetings with Parker. "You know that, right? It will be alright."

"How can you know?" she asked him, a tone of sad disbelief in her voice. She didn't believe him. But she had to.

"Because I know how you feel," he told her, gently, not wanting to bring up the emotion upheaval of that night again. It didn't work, though, because she watched him with just a little bit of the old, analytical Brennan shining through, although her gaze was clouded with memories.

"And I survived."

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**_Since the FOX people are great at messing with promos, I'm pretty sure the scenes are not the way they are shown. Maybe Brennan made a completely different mistake, who knows?_**

**_This is just my -admittedly not so good- fictitious fan writing about it. _**

**_:-)_**

**_Tell me what you thought!  
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End file.
